September 26, 2010

• Planting trees you will not sit in the shade of

  (For those of you who read and do not see my sermons, I provided Norway and Colorado Blue Spruce seedlings to those who had a place to plant them as a sermon illustration.)

  This seedling is about a half a foot tall when planted.  They will grow around one to two foot a year for the first twenty five years.  That means it will take close to fifty years for this seedling to reach its full maturity.  I don’t know how many of us plan to be around for another fifty years and even if we are, how likely are we to be living in the same place?  Planting these seedlings is an act of faith.  We are a people of faith and that should affect how we live in this world.

   

  I am told we have become a culture of the immediate.  We expect communication to be immediate, we expect people to be carrying their cell phones at all times and immediately available to us.  We expect to be able to turn on our TV or power up our computer and see what is going on anywhere in the world immediately.  People over forty expect problems to be resolved in a half hour, while I am told people under forty expect solutions in a minute or two.    We have little patience for things that require time.  We want the recession resolved in a few months, we want the war over in a few days, and we want the Freedom Tower completed yesterday, we want what we want and we want it now.  It is very difficult to get anyone interested in a project that will take months, let alone years, or decades to complete.  We don’t build many cathedrals anymore.  And, if we do, we have all the modern equipment to build them in a matter of months rather than years.  I am told one of the causes of the rapid decline of our nation’s infrastructure is the speed with which we built our roads and bridges and buildings.  It used to be that these things were constructed over time and ground faults, or weak materials were identified before the project was completed.  There was a time when wood used in construction was allowed to cure over long periods of time before being used.  Now the wood used in construction will sometimes actually sprout because it is so green.  Getting things done quickly does not always mean getting things done well.

   

  Sometimes taking our time and thinking things through can save us a world of hurt.  Have you had the experience of sending an e-mail or picking up the phone and calling somebody to let them know how you feel about them only to realize, had you taken the time to sit down and write a letter and put it in the mail, you would have never would have mailed it?  As a people of faith, we should realize there is more to our life than satisfying our immediate desires.  We do not live just for this moment or even just for our lifetime.  We are called to build a foundation that will support the generations that follow us. 

   

  We will be entering into a stewardship campaign.  We will be asking each of you to make a pledge to the church as to what your level of giving will be for the next year.  We ask this so we can create a responsible budget for the church.  We have a building we need to keep in good repair so it will be available for years to come to provide a place for the Word of God to be shared and the people of God can gather to do the work of God in this community.  This congregation will be asked to make a commitment to a pastor in the coming year.  Making a commitment of financial support is only a small part of what you should pledge to the church.  We are also called to be the Word of God in action in the community.  Each one of us has the ability to raise up the future of the church as Paul raised up Timothy to see beyond earthy gain and preach a Gospel that will endure beyond this life.  We are asked to plant seedlings that may appear insignificant and we may never see grow to maturity based on our faith that they will be needed in the future.  We plant words of God’s love and grace in young minds and trust God will bring them to maturity.  We invest in buildings trusting in faith that they will be used by God in the future to provide sanctuary to people we will never meet.  We plant seedlings that will provide fruit and shade to people we do not know because we love them as God loves them.  Where would we be today if previous generations had done nothing to provide for us?

   

  We can be like the rich person in the parable from Luke today and take all we can get out of this life with no thought for others or we can see every small gift we receive as a blessing from God to be shared and protected so we can pass it on to others.  I struggle with the parable because it seems to say the rich are going to hell and the poor and sick are going to heaven and I do not believe that.  I read the story slightly different and I am sure none of you are surprised by that.  I have a sense that we will all spend our eternity in the presence of God and what will make the difference is how we have prepared ourselves in this life for that eternity.  If we have lived this life for ourselves, taking all we can get, looking out only for ourselves then eternity with God is going to be difficult for us, we won’t have much that is familiar to us there.  If, on the other hand, we live this life seeking to know what God would have us to do, looking for ways to serve others as Jesus served, if we care not only about our own comfort and safety but care as much for the comfort and safety of others as we do for ourselves, then I think spending eternity in the presence of God will be all of our desires fulfilled.  What is clear to me, our faith should make a real difference in how we live in this world and what our priorities are.  I believe we are called by faith to plant seedlings that will feed and shelter generations that come after us.  Amen.

  Jeremiah 32:1-3, 6-15

  1 Timothy 6:6-19

  Luke 16:13-31

  • 8:15 am
  • 2 Comments